Volume 2/Book 8/Chapter 6

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Les Misérables, Volume 2: Cosette, Book Eighth: Cemeteries Take That Which is Committed Them, Chapter 6: Between Four Planks
(Tome 2: Cosette, Livre huitième: Les cimetières prennent ce qu'on leur donne, Chapitre 6: Entre quatre planches)

General notes on this chapter

French text

Qui était dans la bière? on le sait. Jean Valjean.


Jean Valjean s'était arrangé pour vivre là dedans, et il respirait à peu près.


C'est une chose étrange à quel point la sécurité de la conscience donne la sécurité du reste. Toute la combinaison préméditée par Jean Valjean marchait, et marchait bien, depuis la veille. Il comptait, comme Fauchelevent, sur le père Mestienne. Il ne doutait pas de la fin. Jamais situation plus critique, jamais calme plus complet.


Les quatre planches du cercueil dégagent une sorte de paix terrible. Il semblait que quelque chose du repos des morts entrât dans la tranquillité de Jean Valjean.


Du fond de cette bière, il avait pu suivre et il suivait toutes les phases du drame redoutable qu'il jouait avec la mort.


Peu après que Fauchelevent eut achevé de clouer la planche de dessus, Jean Valjean s'était senti emporter, puis rouler. À moins de secousses, il avait senti qu'on passait du pavé à la terre battue, c'est-à-dire qu'on quittait les rues et qu'on arrivait aux boulevards. À un bruit sourd, il avait deviné qu'on traversait le pont d'Austerlitz. Au premier temps d'arrêt, il avait compris qu'on entrait dans le cimetière; au second temps d'arrêt, il s'était dit: voici la fosse.


Brusquement il sentit que des mains saisissaient la bière, puis un frottement rauque sur les planches; il se rendit compte que c'était une corde qu'on nouait autour du cercueil pour le descendre dans l'excavation.


Puis il eut une espèce d'étourdissement.


Probablement les croque-morts et le fossoyeur avaient laissé basculer le cercueil et descendu la tête avant les pieds. Il revint pleinement à lui en se sentant horizontal et immobile. Il venait de toucher le fond.


Il sentit un certain froid.


Une voix s'éleva au-dessus de lui, glaciale et solennelle. Il entendit passer, si lentement qu'il pouvait les saisir l'un après l'autre, des mots latins qu'il ne comprenait pas:


Qui dormiunt in terrae pulvere, evigilabunt; alii in vitam aeternam, et alii in opprobrium, ut videant semper.


Une voix d'enfant dit:


De profundis.


La voix grave recommença:


Requiem aeternam dona ei, Domine.


La voix d'enfant répondit:


Et lux perpetua luceat ei.


Il entendit sur la planche qui le recouvrait quelque chose comme le frappement doux de quelques gouttes de pluie. C'était probablement l'eau bénite.


Il songea: Cela va être fini. Encore un peu de patience. Le prêtre va s'en aller. Fauchelevent emmènera Mestienne boire. On me laissera. Puis Fauchelevent reviendra seul, et je sortirai. Ce sera l'affaire d'une bonne heure.


La voix grave reprit:


Requiescat in pace.


Et la voix d'enfant dit:


Amen.


Jean Valjean, l'oreille tendue, perçut quelque chose comme des pas qui s'éloignaient.


—Les voilà qui s'en vont, pensa-t-il. Je suis seul.


Tout à coup il entendit sur sa tête un bruit qui lui sembla la chute du tonnerre.


C'était une pelletée de terre qui tombait sur le cercueil.


Une seconde pelletée de terre tomba.


Un des trous par où il respirait venait de se boucher.


Une troisième pelletée de terre tomba.


Puis une quatrième.


Il est des choses plus fortes que l'homme le plus fort. Jean Valjean perdit connaissance.


English text

Who was in the coffin? The reader knows. Jean Valjean.

Jean Valjean had arranged things so that he could exist there, and he could almost breathe.


It is a strange thing to what a degree security of conscience confers security of the rest. Every combination thought out by Jean Valjean had been progressing, and progressing favorably, since the preceding day. He, like Fauchelevent, counted on Father Mestienne. He had no doubt as to the end. Never was there a more critical situation, never more complete composure.


The four planks of the coffin breathe out a kind of terrible peace. It seemed as though something of the repose of the dead entered into Jean Valjean's tranquillity.


From the depths of that coffin he had been able to follow, and he had followed, all the phases of the terrible drama which he was playing with death.


Shortly after Fauchelevent had finished nailing on the upper plank, Jean Valjean had felt himself carried out, then driven off. He knew, from the diminution in the jolting, when they left the pavements and reached the earth road. He had divined, from a dull noise, that they were crossing the bridge of Austerlitz. At the first halt, he had understood that they were entering the cemetery; at the second halt, he said to himself:—


"Here is the grave."


Suddenly, he felt hands seize the coffin, then a harsh grating against the planks; he explained it to himself as the rope which was being fastened round the casket in order to lower it into the cavity.


Then he experienced a giddiness.


The undertaker's man and the grave-digger had probably allowed the coffin to lose its balance, and had lowered the head before the foot. He recovered himself fully when he felt himself horizontal and motionless. He had just touched the bottom.


He had a certain sensation of cold.


A voice rose above him, glacial and solemn. He heard Latin words, which he did not understand, pass over him, so slowly that he was able to catch them one by one:—


"Qui dormiunt in terrae pulvere, evigilabunt; alii in vitam aeternam, et alii in approbrium, ut videant semper."


A child's voice said:—


"De profundis."


The grave voice began again:—


"Requiem aeternam dona ei, Domine."


The child's voice responded:—


"Et lux perpetua luceat ei."


He heard something like the gentle patter of several drops of rain on the plank which covered him. It was probably the holy water.


He thought: "This will be over soon now. Patience for a little while longer. The priest will take his departure. Fauchelevent will take Mestienne off to drink. I shall be left. Then Fauchelevent will return alone, and I shall get out. That will be the work of a good hour."


The grave voice resumed


"Requiescat in pace."


And the child's voice said:—


"Amen."


Jean Valjean strained his ears, and heard something like retreating footsteps.


"There, they are going now," thought he. "I am alone."


All at once, he heard over his head a sound which seemed to him to be a clap of thunder.


It was a shovelful of earth falling on the coffin.


A second shovelful fell.


One of the holes through which he breathed had just been stopped up.


A third shovelful of earth fell.


Then a fourth.


There are things which are too strong for the strongest man. Jean Valjean lost consciousness.


Translation notes

"Qui dormiunt in terrae pulvere, evigilabunt; alii in vitam aeternam, et alii in approbrium, ut videant semper."

Daniel 12:2-3: And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt.

De profundis.

Beginning of the psalm 130, De profundis clamavi - I cried out from the depths.

Requiem aeternam dona ei, Domine.

Textual notes

Citations